


It's Like Light

by The_Carnivorous_Muffin



Series: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-30 09:12:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15748671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Carnivorous_Muffin/pseuds/The_Carnivorous_Muffin
Summary: Hermione Granger approaches Minerva McGonagall during her office hours to discuss Harry Potter's overwhelming talent and Minerva isn't quite sure what to think of it all.





	It's Like Light

Minerva McGonagall had never seen a student as talented as the young Harry Potter.

She remembered teaching his father, a gifted student by all means, the best student in his year in spite of his wandering attention and youthful enthusiasm. James Potter had always had the knack, that way of viewing the transformation that was integral to higher and more complicated transfigurations, and in him there had been so much possibility.

So much bright possibility snuffed out far too soon by senseless war. It seemed so long ago and yet so recent, ten years, it was such a misleading way of measuring time.

Harry was far better than his father had ever been and he was only eleven years old.

It was hard to describe it, to Albus, to Severus, to anyone who asked and often she found herself relating the first time she had seen him Transfigure an object.

The first day of class she handed him a matchstick, smiling down at him, he had stared at it only for an instant and then right in front of her without a wand and without blinking it had transformed into a silver needle. Transformed wasn’t quite the word though, there was no visible transition; rather it was as if it had always been a needle and that the wooden quality had been a glamour.

Filius described a similar wonderment from Charms, beyond prodigy he had proclaimed, and to Minerva privately he had even added, “This truly is the Boy Who Lived, Minerva.” And he was, thinking on him and the focus and ability he was something that deserved a title, something that made you feel small even with a mastery in your field.

Perhaps most telling of all was Severus, who had never shown Harry any kindness or sympathy, had proclaimed that Harry Potter was his best student in the year; he had only amended that he was not truly gifted as if this somehow negated the grudgingly dispensed compliment.

Often, when looking over his essays, she wondered to himself what he was truly capable of when he seemed so at ease in class so unchallenged. What wonders could he accomplished if he was only pushed, only guided.

She had spoken with many people about Harry Potter and his seemingly unbelievable talent but she had not expected to speak to her own students about him.  

A little after the holidays had ended and classes had resumed Hermione Granger came to her office hours with a look of resignation and sorrowful bewilderment on her face.

Hermione Granger was also very gifted, bright and determined and always ready to do her best, more than gifted she was also a wonderful student engaged and always eager to help others if they were frustrated. For a while Minerva had worried about the social aspect of her education, she would only ever see Hermione alone no matter if she was in the Great Hall or the library, even Harry who was so terribly quiet could be seen with Ronald Weasley. However by Christmas it appeared that Harry and Hermione had grown close so that by the time they returned from break Hermione was more cheerful than she had been before and seemed more relaxed.

Looking at her expression then, as she walked through the door, it had been like looking into those days when Hermione had seemed to have no one at all.

After introductions Hermione had quickly gotten to the point, “Professor McGonagall, why… Why is Harry so good at magic?”

“What do you mean, Miss Granger?”

Again Hermione hesitated but something in her eyes sharpened a bit and when she had looked across at McGonagall it was as if she wasn’t an eleven year old girl but someone much older and there was something truly desperate in her eyes, “Why is Harry so good at magic?”

In any other year Hermione Granger would have been her top student without question but she was not in any other year and so Minerva had to prepare herself to explain why life was sometimes unfair. What is talent and why do some have so much and the rest of us have just a little less? It was a question that many did not come to grips with and to see Hermione battling it at such a young age was more than a little heart wrenching.

“Some students, people I should say as this doesn’t change as life goes on, simply have more ability than others. There’s no reason for it, but that does not mean we don’t try to do our best to catch them. Mr. Potter is very naturally gifted, Hermione, but you are the better student.”

She had meant for that to be reassuring but Hermione only smiled grimly back at her, tears pricking at the corners of her eyes, “Yes, I am the better student.”

And she said those words as if they meant nothing, breaking Minerva’s heart slightly, she dabbed her eyes slightly with a sleeve and continued, “I suppose it doesn’t really matter, you’re right, my essays are better than his even if he’s always… I don’t suppose he writes about it, how he really thinks about magic I mean.”

She smiled weakly at Minerva and Minerva couldn’t help but recall that Harry’s essays had never been excellent, always good but never excellent, saying whatever she had expected them to say but never straying beyond into anything extraordinary. Of course, he was only eleven, so it was unlikely he would be theorizing but still she had remembered being disappointed at the sight of them as if she had expected more from him.

Hermione seemed to want to talk to though, not to hear Minerva’s opinions, just to talk to someone who was willing to listen and who wasn’t Harry Potter with whom she was competing, “When he talks about magic it’s like he isn’t talking about magic at all but talking about something else entirely… I don’t know what, but it’s beautiful, and it’s so hard to understand. It’s nothing like what’s written in our textbooks, you know if he didn’t write the essays I don’t think he’d even have read them at all, it’s like he’s… Like he’s born out of time, like he should have been born later but he’s here and… I try so hard to understand, to be as good as him, I asked him for help you know. And he does help, but when he talks I just know, I’m not him and I can’t… I don’t understand it.”

Here she cut herself off, dabbing at her eyes again, “I’m sorry, I just… I just wanted to know if you knew why…”

She trailed off and just looked at Minerva with that same weak smile she had given earlier, and in her eyes Minerva could see the words she was leaving out, the realization that Harry would never tell Minerva or any other professor what he was truly thinking. That his essays would only be what they expected of him, nothing more and nothing less. That somehow Minerva was incapable of understanding, that something now separated the knowledge Hermione had and her own.

“Well, thank you anyway, professor McGonagall.” She said and rose from her chair making her way slowly to the door.

“Miss Granger?” Minerva called after her, “What does he say about magic?”

“He says that it’s like light.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a 100th review on fanfiction.net where someone asked for Hermione to talk about Harry with a professor.
> 
> Thanks for reading, comments, kudos, and bookmarks are greatly appreciated.


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